My friends and I took a trip in Izu Peninsula with motorbikes for three days. It was great trip! At first, I introduce about Izu to you simply. It is wonderful peninsula in Shizuoka prefecture and it has very beautiful beaches on the Pacific Ocean, many hot springs and strange flowers and plants because Izu Peninsula used to be a small island in the Pacific Ocean anciently. It seemed to move for Japan so slowly and finally collide with the main island of Japan. Some strange plants seem to inhabit warmer area than Japan. Izu Peninsula is one of the most popular sightseeing spots in Japan for the seasons stated above.
Our purpose was to go around Izu Peninsula and to take some outside hot springs. We didn’t book any hotels because we like adventure. So I brought my tent, bedroll and a few changes of clothes, and what I had done before departure was research about outside hot springs only.
First dayMy friend, Yabe, and I left for Izu at 10:00 carrying very big rucksack with motorbikes. We stopped two places on the way to Izu.
One is Shiraito Waterfall by Mt. Fuji. The water is melted snow of Mt. Fuji so it was very clear and cold. We enjoyed the magnificent flow of water.
Next, we visited Asian Craft Shop AOKI. The shop’s owner is a friend of Hung who was my guide in Vietnam so I kept Hung’s present for him so went there to give him the gift and to say Hi! You can see some works of art drinking some coffee in the shop. If you like some works, you can buy it. It looks modern exhibition. The owner welcomed us. It was kindness of him to treat two coffees for us. We saw some works and pictures. There were colorful and modern works as well as Asian craft. I had never been to such a cool shop but I want to go to some shop like AOKI and to see a lot of wonderful works positively because It may be good for my brain and make my sensitivity be better, I think. Anyway, the shop was good so that I want to go there again. It’s not so far.
It began to rain when we left the shop.
It was start of trouble.
It became hard rain as soon as we left and the wind was getting strong gradually. Then it was so far, about 100km to the first hot spring. We concentrated on driving for a long time. The hard rain hit our faces, it was so painful that we were unable to speed up.
It was getting dark and we began to run a long mountain road. My motorbike is so old and broken a little that water entered the engine from an inlet duct. The condition was very bad. Sometimes it stopped but there was a mountain road so we had no one to depend on.
We were drenched to the skin and so cold. We managed to get down and visited a convenient store and drank a coffee but it didn’t work at all. It was until 20km to our destination. We decided to abandon pitching a tent and look for a private hotel near the first hot spring. Exerting all our strength, we left for the destination.
Anyway, we wanted to look for a hotel and take a bath early so that we then the policeman came out in plain directly went to a police box by the hot spring. We said Hi at the entrance clothes. My friend asked him a private hotel that could accept us from even now. It was about 8 pm. He was so nice parson. He took us to a private hotel and asked the owner to accept us. Fortunately, the owner was willing to accept us and bring some towels for us.
At once, we took a bath and warm ourselves. The hot water was same hot spring we wanted to go to. It’s very hot and a little salty. After that we had dinner. The hotel is for staying overnight without meals but the first floor was drinking bar. The bar looked a little strange and interesting restaurant so that the owner cooks foods on an iron plate in our table. The foods were so fresh and delicious that we ate many foods, a squid, seafood and vegetable pancakes and baked boar meat. Of course, we drank much beer. Some local people were drinking beside us. So we talked with them. One of them was a local newspaper reporter and he knows Izu peninsula very well. He gave us some advices. Though it had been very hard a little while ago, we were able to have a good time and meet nice people. I appreciate them very much. We promised to go there again.
Second day
We woke up at 8 am and had a breakfast by the owner. It’s also delicious! Especially, fresh horse mackerel was so good! Then we packed our wet baggage. As luck would have it, it was fine day so we dried some important clothes on our rucksack.
At 10:00. My friend, Kenichi joined us and went to the southest spot in Izu peninsula. We ate broiled corns with soy sauce after a long time. It was also good. Have you cooked like this? If you have never done, please try once! I bet you will like it.
This photo is our accommodations of second night. Here is close to 24h free hot spring because 3 friends was supposed to join us at midnight so we was able to take a bath every time there. After we pitched tents, we went to special hot spring someone runs so we had to pay about $5 for the bath. It’s really good view! I think more value than $5. You don’t know it was so difficult to take pictures there, because the hot spring was for men and women. I paid attention to young women when I took pictures.
3 friends joined us at midnight and we drank and talked about some troubles. They also seemed to have some troubles, a tire had blown out and they had lost their way…
Third day
We left for a beautiful beach at 9 am. The sea was clear and beautiful but it was so cool that no one despite of us enjoyed swimming in the sea. We had not seen such beautiful sea for a long time, so we are excited and enjoyed swimming and taking some pictures like children. Do you understand what the last photo means? It means “ the evolution of the human race”. The background is human’s mother, enormous ocean. I like this photo.
Next, we went to a hot spring in mountain. You can take a bath seeing a big waterfall there. In addition, there were some unique baths. We enjoyed them very much. Here is popular sightseeing spot because there were 7 waterfalls and you can see all of them easily by foot. We also walked around there and saw them.
This trip was very interesting and I was able to details of hot springs in Izu Peninsula. I like Izu more than before. I want to try adventures more, I think. However, I got tired a little.
In traveling what one wants is a companion; in life compassion!
My local friends and I had a birthday party for Ikko and me. He was also close to my birthday and he seemed to be 40 years old. We are not so close age but good friends always we play soccer. We have a game next weekend. So we told about formation and strategy for it. We will do our best so win the game!
My parents and I went to a hospital where Taichiro was to see him and say congratulation! The baby in photo is Taichiro. There were many babies around him and some of them were crying, others were sleeping but he sometimes looked us with a smile. He is very cute! My farther told us the baby was similar to Shoichi who is farther of the baby many times. The baby is too small to judge who he is similar to, I tought.
